Have you ever heard the story about a ghost lady dressed in white on the old Bayview Bridge in Jefferson County?

Did you see her? Most people who have lived in Jefferson County, Alabama for a while have heard the ghost story about the ‘lady of the lake’ at Bayview bridge. The way the bridge was constructed caused tires to make strange noises when you crossed it and high school boys use to take their girlfriends across the bridge to scare them. The old bridge was replaced in 1977, but many say that the area still remains haunted.

There are many stories about the identity of the ‘lady of the lake’, but the following stories were often repeated.

The first is that the ghost is supposed to be a lady that lived in Edgewater back in the early 1940’s that had hired a lady in Bayview to make her wedding dress. It was before everybody had cars and people still walked most everywhere they went. It was stated that the girl had gone to her final fitting and was on her way back home with her dress when she was attacked by a pack of wild dogs and killed. Another version states that the girl ran away from her wedding when she crossed the bridge and her car ran off the bridge and a third version states that she crashed through the guard rail on the night of her wedding and she is looking for her groom.

Another story is that a mother and her child were crossing the bridge in their car and it crashed into the creek. The mother survived but the child did not and the mother haunts the bridge looking for her child.

Once a man reported a new car suddenly stopped on the bridge and he saw strange misty figures on the bridge.

Hand prints on windshields were often reported by people.

Do you know of other stories?

Model Village built by Tennessee Coal and Iron Company

In the 1900s, Tennessee Coal and Iron Company built a model village for its coal mining operations west of Docena in Jefferson County and even received an award at the New York World’s Fair. Bayview was the last of TCI’s town-building ventures.

In the process of building the community, they dammed up Village Creek at a point where there was a steep gorge and made a man-made lake. The dam diverted water to be used in the Ensley Steel Mill four miles away and was considered an “engineering marvel in its day.

The community included a commissary for shopping, doctor’s office, schools, community center/library, churches, and parks. Public bus service was available to other communities in the county.

Company Church in Mulga (Library of Congress)

Mulga Commisary, Birmingham, Jefferson County, AL – Three entrances to former company meat, grocery and dry goods (Library of Congress)

Mulga Left Pavillion – Mulga Commisary, Off AL 269 at I 20-59, Birmingham, Jefferson County, AL (Library of Congress)

Houses were owned by TCI and rented to the workers

This community typically consisted of two, three, four, and five room houses that were owned by TCI and rented to the workers. The rent was USD $2.00 per room per month for the TCI employees living in the homes. Later TCI eliminated the rental program and sold the homes to the workers. TCI was later purchased by U.S. Steel corporation.

TCI Double two-room house with side porches and steel roof Edgewater Community (Library of Congress)

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Discordance: The Cottinghams (Volume 1) by Donna R. Causey– A novel inspired by the experiences of the Cottingham family who immigrated from the Eastern Shore of Virginia to Alabama in the early days of statehood.

Inspired by true events and the Cottingham family that resided in 17th century Somerset, Maryland and Delaware, colonial America comes alive with pirate attacks, religious discord, and governmental disagreements in the pre-Revolutionary War days of America.

I have climbed on top of the bridge many times and dived off .We swam there a lot.The lake had large schools of gold fish that we would seine and use for bait on trot lines that we put in the warrior river at black creek .I am 85 and still live 1mile from the bridge.

My Daddy Ronnie Flippo grew up in that camp and boy do I remember stories of Bayview Lake and the cemetery :)!!! I also listened to his stories of playing baseball out there, they were great n I guess part of what made them so great was the way he told them!! Oh yes and I remember him taking us on a late night haunted outing to the dam!!! Miss my Dad dearly!!! He was an amazing man with many awesome stories of his life in Bayview Camp!!!!

I am 74 and I was born in Bayview and have lots of family buried in Village Falls Cemetary. My Papaw( Bob Massey) was the caretaker there at the Dam.. He was also a Baptist preacher. I am related to the Shoemaker and Hand family along with the Massey family. g

I have lived on the street closest to Bayview bridge all my life. When my kids were teens & had party’s we always took the walk down to the bridge, just like we did when I was younger! Scary! Great memories!

The metal bridge has been gone for years. I’ve been across that bridge more times than I could imagine and have never seen a ghost. I will say that many bodies have been pulled from the lake including a baby.

I have been there several years ago but never brave enough to go at night. I always heard the stories about the bridge and it was the one about the women that got killed on the way to her wedding. I think the one about the women looking for her baby was about another bridge but not sure about this. It’s so sad that through the years the original story has gotten lost but it is still a great ghost story. Thanks for reminding me of this, I think I will take my grand daughters one night. I also did hear about her getting in the car and a wet spot would be in the back seat.

Do you remember a story of a policeman that stopped and parked by the bridge late one night and was reading his paper, when suddenly he heard a noise on the hood of his car. When he lowered the paper he was looking face to face at a winged creature with glowing red eyes. He managed to flee from this area at a fast pace in his cruiser.

I did the same thing. I dressed in layers of my friends mothers old peignoirs and stood in the middle of the road on the Mulga side of the bridge. We had backed our car up in the woods. A car came around the curve from Minor and saw me standing there. The car stopped sat there a few seconds and then did a 360 in the middle of the road and took off back toward Minor..It was funny at the time..but a wonder I didn’t get shot or run over

My father (b. 1919) said that Bayview Lake in the beginning was like having a Resort in Bayview …Families would take boats out onto the lake & picnic on the banks of the lake…He spoke of fond memories…Sadly; by the time I was born (50s) the water was murky & it was a place for teens to party & tell ghost stories…. People began to use the lake as a dumping place for stolen cars, garbage etc…Bayview Lake was “Drug” a few times (to clean it) & several cars, cycles, appliances, etc.; were found on the bottom 🙁

I love all you historical prose and photos. They are interesting and very informative about my native state. I was born and raised in Talladega, Al and would love to know of any ‘ghost’ stories in and around that area. Also, information on covered bridges….especially history on one in Eureka community whose covered bridge spanned the Choccolocco Creek in Stemley community. I lived there, 1947-49, before waters were backed up, by Alabama Power company, to create Logan Martin Lake. Do you have photos and history of this bridge and what happened to it? Also other Alabama covered bridges. I am doing a UCLA history term paper on covered bridges and want to have them located in Alabama. Thanking you in advance.

There are only 3 covered bridges left in Blount County. The 4th was destroyed by vandals several years ago. Horton Mill Bridge is on Hwy 75 N just north of Oneonta. It’s the highest. Swann Bridge, the longest, is off Hwy 1 in Cleveland, and Nector Bridge is behind a church on the left side of Hwy 231W.

The NASCAR speedway is supposed to be haunted, as things happen there that never happen at other speedways. The famous crew chief, Jake Elder, always told me he could feel it when he went through the tunnel under the track. The story is that it was built on an old Indian burial ground and forever cursed if anything else occupied the site. During WWII, the AAF had a training base there (now part of the speedway infield and adjacent airport) but it only operated less than two years due to the high number of fatal crashes into nearby mountains. No crops or even grass would grow there. That is why it was the perfect spot for a speedway. I lived in Gadsden and watched it being built, as they were also putting in a sports car road course and I was racing a sports car at the time. The first driver killed there hit the wall just out of Turn 1 on a glancing blow. The car was barely damaged and he had no visible injuries. I was there and saw it happen and saw the car. Later, a driver’s mother was killed in the paddock by the West Coast mirror on a truck, one of Mark Donahue’s crew had both legs cut off when he was sitting on pit wall and the car slid into the pit space. One year most of the cars in the “secure” garage were vandalized the night before the race. Another year Richard Petty’s brother-in-law was pressurizing a small water tank from a large cylinder of air and he exceeded the pressure limit on the water tank and it blew up, hit him in the chest and slung him higher than the Union 76 ball on pit road. We ran to help him, but he was dead when he hit the ground. That is just a few of the strange goings on there.

Sad to say that I went to school with a girl in the 70s, and she and her baby actually did go off this bridge in a car. Both drowned. Never have got the chance to make this trip on Halloween night, but would love to do it sometime just for the fun of it.

I grew up near there and never saw anything unusual, but my mother said she did. She said that when was a young girl, shortly before she married my father (so sometime shortly before 1955), she was riding with my future father and his parents returning to their house after church one night. According to both her and my grandmother, they both saw a woman hanging from the top of the bridge. One of them was in the front seat and one was in the backseat. Both men said they didn’t see anything, but the women’s version of the woman they saw hanging there was exactly the same, right down to the wedding dress she was wearing.

I have seen a ghostly figure with a white dress in the water me and some family wanted to try the legend and i believe that there is something that haunts this bridge i grew up in adamsville alabama so i know a lot about it

My grandmother and mom have always told me about this story. My great grandfather was a cab driver and he swears he picked up a lady and her baby. He went down the road a little ways and looked in the back seat and she was gone. My grandmother later moved to a little house in Mulga and she told me the story over and I always closed my eyes if we ever had to go over the bridge at night!

I’ve lived in Mulga since 1974. I’ve never seen anything ghostly but I do get an eerie feeling when I cross the bridge at night although not as much since the old bridge was replaced with the one there now.

The lady with the baby who crashed into the lake was my cousin. The accident happened August 16, 1973 I will never forget that horrible day. The baby (a boy) was only 2 1/2 months old.

I’ve often heard the story about the bride to be killed by wild dogs and also about the wet spot in the back seat. My brother-in-law used to tease us by stopping in the middle of the bridge at night and telling us to watch out for the ghost.

My cousin was always a little freaked out by the old bridge…..then sadly she lost her life there.

Would your mom’s name happen to be Marilyn who was married I think to Charles Goolsby? If so you lived next door to my sister and her family. My nephew Jeff was supposed to have gone to the party with Donna that day and was looking out the Window and waiting to be picked up. Thank God that Donna forgot to get him or we would have lost him too.

I grew up in Bayview and have heard of all these stories. I worked at Bruno’s when I was a teenager and I have had to walk from minor to the gates of bayview many a night and Inever encountered anything not saying nothing is out there.

I lived in bayview all my life until a couple years ago . It’s always fun to fill up 1000’s of water balloons and throw them at lids on the bridge on Halloween. I never understood why ppl came to see the bridge now built in the 80’s when it was the other bridge that was “haunted”

I grew up in Minor on the last street off of Mulga Loop Road.. Spent many nights as a teenager crossing that bridge. One night I was left on the Mulga side by some crazy friends and had to walk back across to the Minor side. Scared me to death!

I grew up in Minor, on Hillcrest Ave. have family that are still in Bayview, we crossed the old medal bridge all times of day and night all thru the year. Never saw anything but was told all the stories growing up. The guy who said when you move away you seem to leave part of yourself there… So true.. Although I live in fla I still consider myself an Alabama Girl and always will!!! Lots of good memories came to mind as I was reading thru the comments. Thanks for a stroll down memory lane 🙂

Never saw a ghost but I did see the largest snake cross the edge of the bridge there. I think someone must have raised a python to mega size and released it by the bridge. We did make a girl think we where going to throw her over the bridge one night and it is possible that if you listen close you can still hear her voice echoing off in the distant. I guess the more valid question would be who has a fishing lure hanging off of the power line that is adjacent to the bridge.

Yes I remember it well. We were told that if you turn the car off at midnight in the middle of that bridge, it will not crank again and the lady will come and sit in the car with you. I never saw her. One time the car would not crank for a while. ( I think it was a case of the nerves) LOL The cemetery was a creepy place to be.Well worth checking out..

I was in Bayview yesterday buying a lawnmower I found on Craigslist and as I was coming back my toolbox lid on my truck opened and raised up as I was crossing the bridge so I stopped on the other side and got out and closed it. never thought anything about it until reading this article. Kind of strange, oh well. And yes I remember going to this bridge late nights as a teenager and telling all the ghost stories. Was always a creepy feeling

I would like to know more about the bridge that the storys come from is it the bride that is in use now or the very old one that crosses the lake on the back side of bayview also on that old bridge where would the roads come out if they were in use now.

I grew up in bayview til I was 8 and have been left on the bridge at night by my parents. We would stop turn out lights and then run around car. Also you can hear a baby crying at night on the bridge . Miss the old bridge.

i heard that if you park on the bridge and leave a candy bar in the back seat and walk to the other side and back that when you return the candy will be gone and your seat would be wet. But if you got back and the candy bar was still there you would here a baby crying when you left. If your car would crank

We used to go to the bridge often as a teen. We saw the woman once in a long white dress, which was wet, at the beginning of the bridge. Twice we stopped the car in the middle of the bridge and it wouldn’t crank until after it was pushed off the bridge completely. One of those times the back floorboard was wet slightly. Many other times we didn’t see or hear anything at all. Wonderful memories of being scared to death though!

I love this article because it brought back so many memories of growing up in a simpler time in one of those TCI houses in Edgewater, attending Mulga Elementary School and Minor High School. I remember driving over Bayview Bridge and looking for the ghost with my friend Amelia Latham. Creepy but good times!

I love this article because it brought back so many memories of growing up in a simpler time in one of those TCI houses in Edgewater, attending Mulga Elementary School and Minor High School. I remember driving over Bayview Bridge and looking for the ghost with my friend Amelia Latham. Creepy but good times!

Another cemetery is located between hiway 269 and Mulga Loop rd along the lake. It is closer to 269 and in recent years has been registered on Alabama’s historical places site. There is a plaque there now. It used to have many sunken graves and very few markers. I have not been there for many years. I can remember a dirt road on the left right before the bridge that went all the way thru to 269. The last time I drove thru there I could see no sign of that road. Spooky place!

Oldest story is that an old woman who lived in the area had a mental disorder and went to the bridge and jumped off after tying her bonnet to the bridge. Basically she committed suicide. Her bonnet was found but her body was never found. Went across the bridge many times going to family reunions in mulga but have never seen ghost. My grandmother swore that the woman was my great great grandmother!

On my 13th birthday my friends and brother drove out to see the girl on the bridge when we didn’t see her we went to the cemetery after leaving our car went dead on the rail road tracks unfortunately we were hit by a train coming from TCI.

I RAN TRAINS THROUGH EDGE WATER AND MULGA FROM THE LATE 1980 TO 2012 I AM RETIRED FROM THE B.S. NOW. WE RELEIVED A CREW THAT HIT A TRUCK AT THE CROSSING GOING INTO THE OLD TRAILER PARK THERE IN MULGA , SADLY KILLED THE MAN. BUT HAVE SEEN SOME STRANGE THINGS OVER THE YEARS INCLUDEING A ALLIGATOR ON SIDE THE TRACKS ONE NIGHT ,ME AND MY CONDUCTOR THOUGH WE WERE SEEING THINGS. I GREW UP IN LIPSCOMB HEARD ALL THE STORIES, GLAD TO READ ABOUT THESE THINGS YOU WOULD HERE ABOUT AS KIDS SAD HOW THINGS CHANGE OVER THE YEARS. THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES.

There is still another version! A girl had a 3-legged dog and somehow they fell off bridge! People claimed to see dog pretty often on bridge! The girl was supposedly pick up by a person one night and asked to be taken to an address! When he arrived at address there was only a wet spot where girl was sitting!

All this must have taken place after I lived in the area. I went to Mulga School from 1938-1943. I rode the bus across Bayview Bridge to Minor High School. We had to pick up students in Bayview. My best friend, Mary Elizabeth Hill lived in Bayview. Betty Ray Chandler also lived there, or was it Edgewater? Minor 1943-1947.

I was raised in Minor. A little community close to Bayview. The cemetery and the bridge are surrounded by stories. And it was a source of fun for many in my generation. The whole area is rich with tales of death, gambling and bars in the backwoods of these mining and steel towns. But it’s also rich in churches and good ole Southern values. My father is buried at Village Falls and it a very peaceful place. I’ve never seen a ghost or heard a scary sound. But the bridge is a different story. It is a creepy place and even though the old bridge is gone, I still think of the ghost story when I cross it.

My family moved to Bayview in 1944, have been here ever since. Does anyone remember the old tennis courts, the little school, I have the bell from it, the old bath house. I was to grown up to go to the little school so I went to the Big School, when we had a community building, TCI let us use one of the old machine shop buildings for a church, Baptist one Sunday, Methodist the next, lots of fun and a good place to live. We had a company store, a bus line to Ensley, skating on the Mulga Road, if you had a car, there was no gasoline. Gasoline was rationed and stamps were precious. I was here when Germany surrendered at the end of World War II, when the bombs were dropped on Japan. Long long time ago, not many of us old timers are still here, but we keep plugging on. Have a picture of Mr. Petty in his army uniform during World War I, someone might be interested in seeing it. We had a doctor’s office and it only cost $1.00 to see the doctor and the medicine was free. We’ve come a long way, baby to Obama that will bankrupt us all.

I grew up in Bayview – moved there in 1952. I started Bayview Elementary school in the 2nd grade. I’ve heard all the Bayview Bridge stories and repeated them to my kids every time we crossed the bridge. Somtimes, I would go out of my way just to cross the old bridge. I have friends and distant relatives still living there. Bayview memories have a very special spot in my heart. I’ve never seen anything on the bridge but it wasn’t for lack of trying! I live in Texas now and miss the old places.

Yes I lived in Edgewater.we also had a company store and a doctor,s office.I have been in the company store in bayview too.there are two cemeteries,one is village falls and the other is just off 169 .I,ve been to both.I played baseball in both Bayview and Edgewater.

Yes I believe it is too!! My Daddy Ronnie Flippo grew up there and that is how I learned about the stories!! He would take us to the bridge late at night and even one time we walked down that old Dam road after they had closed it!!! Boy that one really scared the dickens out of me!!! Been to the cemetery many times. I have seen some ghosts and have heard stories of the Bayview boys my Daddy ran around with oh and how other schools were scared to play ball because they were would whoop em , and butt whippings he got from his daddy for sneaking out of church n taking Dad’s car :)!! So many stories from a wonderful man!!! Oh n how my Aunt Barbara would lock him out of the house til there Mom n Dad would get home 😀 !!! I sure do miss my Dad and his many stories from Bayview Al. It is a special place and always will be in my heart!!

I remember that Gary Cooper :). My Daddy Ronnie Flippo used to take us out to the bridge, cemetary, and Dam as a child. I’ve heard many stories as a child and cherish them all!! Down to the Bayview boys!! He was an awesome man!!

My beloved grandmother “Mimps”, Naomi Cooper, wife of Aubrey Cooper Sr., lived on Railroad Ave, next the last home on that street, next to the Edwards. I would love to connect with Sue Edwards, married one of the Edwards boys who were always so good to Mimps. I also grew up crossing the grated bridge. My brother and I loved how it “howled”, so before dad (Joe Cooper) drove over, we’d pretend to slap one another and open our mouths as if to “scream” as the tires whistled from the grate of that bridge. I’m also looking for photos of the old Bayview Dr grocery store – remember those 2″ blank wood floors so vividly.

Crossed this bridge many times as a kid while traveling to visit my Grandmother in Bayview. The car tires would make a singing sound against the grate floor of the bridge when we crossed. The “singing bridge” was my que to wake up from the back seat and get ready to arrive. The bridge has since been replaced by a more modern one. I never did see a ghost there.

Tennessee, Coal and Iron. What a bridge for such a little lake. But is or was it so little? Amazing structure expressing the need for strength over this water’s body. A strip pit of the mine world, a cave in, or the watery grave of so many miners, steel workers and their families that were swallowed in the struggle or slipped in the sink hole’s current. Fishing on Bayview Lake. Bubbles, and they weren’t just from fish. Hallowed ground. Few are alive that know all or some of the bodies there, one former county commissioner, come preacher, might still be around.

I heard there was a midget who snorted a line of Coke off the railings of the bridge and a bus full of midget strippers drove off the bridge and died and every night at 11:32 you can see you little fellow walking down the bridge crying

I also remember the story of a lady seen on Ruffner Road in Irondale by the Bass Cemetery supposedly trying to get a ride then disappearing from the back seat. Good story to keep the kids entertained.lol

Yes I remember! Our story was about the lady and baby who wrecked. They said if you parked in the middle of the bridge and turned your car off and lights off you could hear the baby cry. Scared the pee out of me!

[…] 5th grade at Bayview Elementary School. The school was located in the mining community of Bayview, Alabama. It has been gone for many years now but I have never forgotten the teachers. They were […]

I remember the graves on the left marked with brick on the way to the dam and also found real old baseball uniforms not far away live in Washington ST. now .was a happy time. Patsy P. USE TO DELIVER newspaper then lived next to Alvin L AND FAMILY.

Being a commercial diver for thirty years everywhere I traveled someone would approach me SOMEONE they knew told them divers had seen a catfish at a local dam that was big as a Volkswagen. Have you ever seen one that big? I would go through an impressive number of dams I had worked at and have never seen a cat that big and if I do I’ll haul buggy! Now if I ever see a ghost at this Alabama bridge I’ll haul buggy!!

Yep I’ve seen her …. I was raised in Edgewater n Minor and lived in Bayview when I was married to my first husband …. I seen her when I was 14 , I’ve seen other ghost at the cemetery … I’ve seen a woman n her baby pulled from the lake , n a few others … Before they fixed the S curves I seen the Roto rooter man wreck n die … Alot of mysterious things always around there ….. Does anybody remember hearing or seeing things glowing in the lake

April 10, 1949 a mother and her 2 daughters from Bayview went to see a movie in Ensley. One daughter wanted to see a different movie so they split up. The little girl was gone when they came out. Phyllis Dean Carver was found the next day beside the lake dead. She had been molested and mutilated. The girl was 9 years old. Coming from Minor just before the lake there used to be a dirt road on the left that hugged the lake and went around to the old cemetery and continued on to 269. Its still there from 269 to the cemetery but has long been gone from the cemetery to Mulga Loop road. This is the road she was found on. I have lived within 3 miles of here for 42 years and have heard all the stories. Thats the only one that I have found to be provable to the point of putting a name to it and finding actual newspaper articles and such as evidence it actually happened. The cemetery mention also was the haunted cemetery where your car would die going around the loop, not the new cemetery at the walking track across from the Masonic lodge. I’d love to find more info about the woman who drove into the lake in the 70s if anyone has a name.

I remember the old t-shirt Charlie stories my brother and his friends they used to scare me and my sister to death.

And I still don’t want to go over that bridge late at night especially on Halloween I will go all the way around and go down birmingport road before I go over that bridge. Battle Bridge made the most horrible creepy spooky sounds you ever heard. I was little but I even remember the old wooden boards. Mulga and Bayview was a special place to grow up as a kid back in those days, it’s not quite like that today I still live here.

My Grandmother lived in Bayview. When I was a kid, my folks used to drive down from Huntsville on Friday evening to spend the weekend with her. The Singing Bridge always gave me my que to wake up because we were almost there.

[…] 5th grade at Bayview Elementary School. The school was located in the mining community of Bayview, Alabama. It has been gone for many years now but I have never forgotten the teachers. They were […]

The church pictured above was a commu ity church in the community of Edgewater and when built it served the Baptist one week and the Methodist the next. It served many years as the Methodist church in Edgewater until the 1998 tornado that destoryed it.

Looks like this was removed: The church pictured above was a community church in the community of Edgewater and when built it served the Baptist one week and the Methodist the next. It served many years as the Methodist church in Edgewater until the 1998 tornado that destoryed it.

We are excited here at AP. Our latest volume in our popular Alabama Footprints series has been released.

The eighth edition, BANISHED, documents The Indian Removal Act called for the “voluntary or forcible removal of all Indians” residing in the eastern United States to the west of the Mississippi River. Between 1831 and 1837, approximately 46,000 Native Americans were forced to leave their homes in southeastern states. Available in paperback and ebook at this link

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